


And Then I'll Go to Bed

by shadoedseptmbr



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: F/M, fairytale
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2005-02-02
Updated: 2005-02-02
Packaged: 2017-11-01 20:44:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 290
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/361055
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shadoedseptmbr/pseuds/shadoedseptmbr
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Just a quiet bedtime tale, in the long ago.</p>
            </blockquote>





	And Then I'll Go to Bed

**Author's Note:**

> Not quite a drabble, not quite a story. Not really a poem as there is neither rhyme nor meter. Call it a vignette, set in Buffy's early childhood. No spoilers, if you've seen the show. Nothing explicit, merely the suggestion of later events. Title comes from a little ditty my own mother used to sing while putting me to sleep. Thanks to Sofia, for encouraging me to post this, odd little thing that it is.

\--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

"Mommy! Mommy, tell me a story!"  
"Which book do you want, Buffy?"  
"No! A real story!"  
"Oh, well...'Once upon a time, a little blonde princess...'"  
"No, Mommyyyy. A true story."  
"Buffy, I don't understand."  
"Tell me about love."  
"About...love?"

And so mother tells daughter about love.  
She tells of warmth and of comfort and of safety.  
She speaks of joy and of baby toes and picnics.  
She describes what she knows of faith and hope and trust.  
Of roses, pink and white and red.  
To be fair, she mentions duty and worry.  
She glosses over heat and need and gain.  
She neglects pain and loss and obsession  
as well as the shades of tears.  
And it is in keeping with her mother love that she does this.  
For what would her little princess ever know of these?

She does not mention friction or burden or desire.  
There is no thought of anguish or guilt or blood.  
From Sunday School, she remembers patience and kindness and always.  
But Saturday Night never taught her of chains or cruelty or eternity.  
And what she knows of danger, her child cannot need.  
And what she remembers of fire, she ignores.  
She has not yet learned of abandonment or forgiveness,  
so she cannot speak of sunrise or ashes.

She thinks of mattresses, but not alleyways or altars.  
She thinks of love-bites, but never bruises.  
She thinks of nights and moonlight and red satin sheets,  
but she is sure those are soft tales for other days.  
She forgets, or does not know, that when Love comes riding its pale horse,  
it is not always in knightly garb.

And you cannot blame her for that  
as she tucks scented rainbow sheets around her little girl. 


End file.
